I have a huge collection of letters and envelopes accumulated thru years. A little bit belong to my family and ancestors, biggest part is a showcase of my correspondence activities in the 2000s (in the pre-torrent era I traded music and videos a lot and was a huge fan and propagandist of B&P practice, if you know what does that mean). Some have nothing to do with me personally and just stuck to my hands during my reids to the flea market. I love all sorts of old papers, you know...
My stamps collection that I accumulated in teen years was left at parents house - I asked to take a pic to show you, but cannot present all in details. I was very into the trivia marks of Great Britain, France, Portu, Germany and their colonies - mostly for their scent of history.
I better show you the stamps from the letters I have at hand.
A few letters are from 1927. The backside of envelope is very cool, looks even better than front face.
They have applied stamps issued for the 10-year anniversary of the Great Russian Revolution of 1917. (Of course, they celebrated the events of October, not March - just today we know that these were not two different events, but one single chain). Fate scattered millions of people to different corners of the country - one remained at St.Petersburg (the letters are addressed here), the other ended up in Vladivostok - quite the opposite corner of the country, month's journey away by train. No instant mobile communication, even regular phone was out of the option! Imagine - a gap two months deep between you and your loved one. Any signal, be it question or answer, takes two months to travel and return back. So that your connection will not become covered with dust and ash and remained alive - you are left to write letters as often as possible, every day.
Two stamps below belong to the sixth standard series of the USSR. They were issued and circulated from August 1939 to 1956 - that is, at the death of Stalin; these stamps cast their shadow on postal communications during the hardest years of the war and the post-war reconstruction of the country. The stamps depict a miner, a Red Army soldier and a pilot - exactly the same as on the 1, 3 and 5 ruble banknotes of 1938. You can imagine - they were printed in huge print runs and do not represent a unique rarity or philatelic value.
The last ones from the old days, before we move further. I did not have these in my collection - I took communion and held them in my hands while working on a book about the Great Flood of 1924. These stamps, as you can read on the overprints, were intended to raise funds to help flood victims. After all, stamps are a great aid in studying history.
Wartime drama produced some simplified forms: letters had no stamps or envelopes, the post office used to accept the letters themselves, folded into such characteristic triangles; the folks sitting in the trenches usually did not have even the paper - not speaking there was no stationery store nearby to buy stamps and envelopes.
So, no stamps for this one.
...After the crush of colonial empires in 1950-60-es the stamps out there became less intresting and attractive to me personally.
Envelopes with USSR stamps from 70-80-es are a part of history, the idea of throwing them away doesn't come to my mind ... but let's face it: stamps from this era do not attract me visually too much.
The closer we get to the final stop and termination of the Soviet Union in 1991 - the less interesting the stamps become. I don't know what the paradox is exactly... but the stamps do correspond with the history, I think that's the point.
I like the graphic design of the USSR coat of arms on the 1966 stamp - feel its strength and inner power! can't compare with the 1988 version, just different scale... simply does not rank!
In August 1991, the USSR disappeared from world maps, disintegrating into post-Soviet fragments that are still fighting each other. (Azerbaijan and Armenia, Russia and Ukraine, Georgia and Ossetia are the most well-known examples). USSR stamps continued their life in the 90s in a new capacity, as provision stores; newly-baked countries rushed to print their stamps, and the easiest, fastest way was to make overprints on old unused USSR stamps (the unspent stock of which was large). Dagestan, Chechnya, Georgia, Transcaucasia, Moldova, Ukraine, Central Asian territories... This is a very interesting topic for collecting, but I can't show you anything from my collection because I don't collect stamps anymore. I'm sending you to Google. 😎
В августе 1991 года СССР исчез с мировых карт, распавшись на пост-советские фрагменты воюющие друг с другом до сих пор. (Азербайджан и Армения, Россия и Украина, Грузия и Осетия - вот самые слышные примеры). Марки СССР в 90-е годы продолжили свою жизнь в новом качестве, как провизории; свеже-выпеченные страны поспешили напечатать свои марки, и самый простой, быстрый способ - сделать надпечатки на старых негашеных марках СССР (неизрасходованный запас которых был велик). Дагестан, Чечня, Грузия, Закавказье, Молдова, Украина, среднеазиатские территории... Это интереснейшая тема для коллекционирования; не могу ничего показать вам из своей коллекции потому что уже не собираю марки. Идите в гугль. 😎
Our next stop is Russia, the largest heir and successor to the "evil empire".
1991 - 1999 is the Yeltsin era, the era of decline and the plundering of the remains of the USSR. The country experienced a great inflation of money and managed to experience a couple of monetary reforms on its own skin, all of this is reflected in stamps and their denominations directly. At the start of this rat race, in 1992, stamps had denominations of 1/2, 1, 2, 3 rubles - but after a few years the count was in the hundreds. I specially laid out two ordinary (non-registered) letters next to each other. It costed 2 rubles to send it at first - and 1050 rubles (!) a year later. All this is funny, but only if you look at it from 50 years distance.
1991 - 1999 годы это эпоха Ельцина, эпоха упадка и раскрадывания остатков СССР. Страна испытала великую инфляцию денег и успела испытать на своей шкуре парочку денежных реформ, все это отражается на марках и их номиналах прямым образом. На старте этих крысиных бегов, в 1992 году, марки имели номиналы 1/2, 1, 2, 3 рубля - то уже через несколько лет счет шел на сотни. Я специально разложил рядом два обычных (незаказных) письма. Отправить его стоило 2 рубля вначале - и 1050 рублей уже через год. Все это конечно забавно, но только если разглядывать из отдаленной на 50 лет точки.
The first stamps are decorated with patriotic and spiritual themes: Saint George the Victorious slaying a dragon, patriots Minin and Pozharsky from a monument on Red Square, a church in Pskov.
Somewhere along the way by the early 2000-es there happened a rebranding, 1st among many. I couldn't google the information now, but I vaguely remember that the rebranding of the logo, stamps and many other things was done by designers from the UK. Well, the result was really worthy. The stamps began to look nicer.
These are the first Russian stamps on a self-adhesive backing, which you don't have to lick with your tongue to stick on an envelope. I hope I haven't mixed anything up. In any case, there were no stamps on self-adhesive paper until the mid-2000s, I don't remember them.
Russia is a republic. (Well, supposedly!). Why do we have all these eagles, coats of arms, orbs, royal attributes that have a taste of tzarist symbolics from a century ago? This feels like an appeal to imperial times, to me. "Let's make Russia great again" and all this BS.
A series of stamps with views of ancient Russian cities, or their central fortresses, to be precise. All of self-adhezive paper.
A few close-ups below:
Looking at the three envelopes below, sent from the US and UK, you will not find any stamps. Stamps are being replaced by cash stamps, and this is of course sad to see - the spirit of philately is fading, there is nothing left to collect. We can only look back into the past, where our ancestors understood it all well and performed better than us...
And the last one, stamps from China (and a pleasurable gigger kitty Open Letter). With stamps from overseas countries being added, now you definitely can title my collection 'international-scale' xD
Thanks for the visit - see you!
All images taken by me, copyright (c) 